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All About Careers - Pharmacy

Pharmacists are responsible for dispensing and procurement of medicinal products and supplies. You can find these guys in hospitals, health centres, care facilities, clinics, nursing homes, GP surgeries, supermarket chains and retail pharmacies. There are many different types of pharmacists but they can be broadly split up into community pharmacists and hospital pharmacists.

The gatekeepers of medical supplies, community pharmacists dispense prescription and over-the-counter medicines and formulations.  They are absolute experts when it comes to the different medicines, providing us with vital information on recommended dosage and potential side effects. Hospital pharmacists’ are also in charge of dispensing medicinal products and supplies, but they also work with other medical personnel to provide treatments and advice to patients. They are in charge of ensuring the safe and secure storage of all medicines and hospital supplies, preparing certain medicines and conducting quality checks.

You can’t just walk straight into a pharmacy career. You’ll need A-levels in at least two science subjects; one of which should be chemistry.  Then you will need to obtain an MPharm degree. This takes four years to complete, followed by 12 months of training before you can become a registered pharmacist. A pharmacist should be good at conveying complex technical information, have great people skills and a scrupulous and systematic approach to work.

Otherwise, if you want to be the person actually developing the drugs then you could work for the pharmaceutical industry. It employs a whole host of scientists to help discover, develop and produce medicines; from pharmacologists, biochemists and engineers, to toxicologists, clinical research analysts and mathematicians. Research and development scientists carry out experiments and develop the medicines in laboratories before rigorously testing their developed products. Then, it’s the turn of engineers and production managers to oversee the production of the medicine on a mass-scale.

There are various ways for you to enter the scientific side of the pharmaceutical industry. The majority of scientists will have a degree in a scientific or engineering subject, such as biology, chemistry, pharmacology, physics, medicine, pharmacy, mechanical engineering or chemical engineering. In fact, most people obtain an MSc or a PhD before entering this line of work.

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